I don't completely understand books on the wish list.  It's my understanding from what I've read that a books is supposed to only be listed on your wish list if it is not available from another member.  I have looked at lots of wish lists and I see many books on wish lists that are available from other members.

Can someone explain this to me? Thank you.

Henri Russell

It may be the same title, but not the same ISBN.  All books are listed by ISBN, with the exception of some which don't have an ISBN or when there are errors in the system for a particular ISBN.  If you do a search for a book by title, you will see that there are multiple versions, each with a different ISBN.  One particular version (ISBN) may be WLed, while others are not.

Sometimes a book will be available under one ISBN (say a mass market paperback) but wish listed under a different ISBN (say a hardcover or maybe a large print edition). Some people are willing to take a book in any edition available, but others want a very specific edition. Just using myself as an example, I almost never wish list mass market paperbacks because the print tends to be too small for me. But at the same time, I would never wish list a large print edition because I don't need my print to be that large, either.

Also some people collect books in series and they want every book in the series to match so they will wish list every hardcover in the series, or every trade paperback in the series, but not the other possible versions.

I'm doing some book editing and noticed there's a book with an assigned ISBN for a hand-entered entry that has three members assigned for its wish list. Is this possible? I thought a PBS-assigned ISBN was for a single copy. Is this situation possible?

Here's the link: www.paperbackswap.com/book/details/150296-Forgiven

Yeah those PBS assigned ISBN's are supposed to only be for that specific copy.  I don't think people realize that the likely hood of it ever being reposted is slim.  I mean the person who originally received it might repost it under that ISBN. But more likely they will use the ISBN on the book and when it comes up as the wrong book or binding they will get a new PBS ISBN for it and not reuse the old one.  It's possible that they might repost it from their TBR pile but it's slim.  When I see those as WL I usually find a similar binding and tag the WL one with the "x posted under ISBN #XXXX". 

I suppose we could all start tagging them as "PBS issued ISBN not to be reused" or something like that.

I know there are some people who will WL one of those if  it's the only one in the database-usually an older OOP/HTF book because they are hopign someone will see that it's WL and post it anyway.

I usually check for system-generated ISBNs whenever I'm posting a book without an ISBN , just in case someone wants it.  And I also will tag the regular ISBN with a "alternate edition-see ISBN XXXXX" tag to help members find a posted system-generated ISBN book...

Thanks for the information.  I understand better now.